Archive for October, 2008

Soldering – 3 days with Sally Jean (and Brad) I almost didn’t notice it RAINED each day. I will say though it cleared up for the most part – but there was always rain.

For now I am just posting the photos from class – it was great. Well it was really two classes – soldering for Virgins and then the glass house class (2 days). There were only 5 of us in the two day class. Boy did I ask a lot of questions, lol. Sally Jean and Brad are both so generous with their knowledge! Thank you!

This day it rained. What a surprise. A native did tell me that they say it rains every day in October.

So this day I took Robert Dancik’s bead like no other and then Jan Harris’s Beachcomber bracelet.

A Bead like no other – now who could NOT sign up for a class like that once they heard the title? At least any beader/jewelery out there! Very interesting class. I definitely learned a lot and will try to make more of these plexiglass beads. The down side is the saw of course, lol. But then again that might be the up side! After one saws a few dozen circles then sawing becomes old hat?

Robert’s work – the second photo can be opened up into a BIG shot. It has one bead with set in items, one with a scratched and painted surface, one bead in the process of being filled with an expansion item, one bead made out of reflectors and the tape trick Robert has for holding the beads while sanding!

Great class and fun teacher. And as a bonus Tonia Davenport was a student in the class. She has additional information on plexiglass (she has a great book out on it). Two teachers in one!

The Beach Bracelet – I can’t remember the class title at the moment. The class was fantastic. If you ever get a chance to take a class from Jan – do. She really tries to get you finished in class. Since this was an evening class that meant 3 hours to do this – well she had kitted EVERYTHING for us. How nice is that?

Jan also demo’d (and let anyone who wanted to do it) the copper charms and how to drill a shell.

Etching and coloring copper in 3 easy steps (ok a bit more but still!!!)

And a couple photos of the classroom and my work area – the only time I did that all week!

The only day of NO RAIN!!! October 1st. Coming from the desert its a bit of a shock to be in rain pretty much 24 hours a day. I never really felt warm, miss that heat. So if you are going to Portland from a dry climate – sweaters are a good idea!

So day 1 I flew in – no classes – just settling in, doing some local shopping, etc. It was fun!

On my first FULL day at Art and Soul 1) it rained all day 2) I took a day class with Stephanie Lee – WOW! and 3) I took a night class with Jan Harris – WOW again!

Chain Gang – what a great name for a class. And we did way more than just chains. The afternoon was devoted to Stephanie’s 3 chain patterns – all excellent and ones I had not learned yet. The morning was spent on Bezels. I have Stephanie’s book and now realize that there is way more information in there than I realized – I need to sit down and re-read the book! The section on bezels I totally missed.

First off – Stephanie’s work is so creative. Here are some of her class examples:

and My bezels –

I was using that teflon sheet and that was great. Considering I literally had a fire inside the rectangle piece in the lower left corner. Don’t know what I am going to do with my C (upper one) – it was what I had left over in the way of metal so I made it…could be interesting!

And that was just the MORNING part of class. I will have to post my sample links later. Forgot to photo those!

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The Bird with Jan Harris. Originally Jan had 3 classes with this bird listed – or three versions. I signed up for the evening – it was the only time I could fit it in and I really loved all of them. Turns out that was the class that went so we did get to look at Jan’s other classwork. For ours we had a full size PLUS bird. I will have to add a photo of mine later with something to give you real perspective. Here is a photo of Karen holding it so that might help. And the birdcage (for a smaller version!) that Jan had for another class:

Since I still haven’t finished my tail these are important photos – initial build of tail and then how it should finish:

I had to slip in the enamel work Jan did in Richard Salley’s class. Its upside down but she did a SCENE. WOW!